Meal Prep #1: Strawberry Oatmeal Crumble - Roasted Veggies - Honey Garlic Chicken - Garlic Rice (recipes included!)

Since my dancing and teaching schedule can be so hectic during the week, I've started meal prepping on the weekends to make the weekdays run more smoothly. Not only is it convenient, but it makes me feel like I have my sh!t together. Super organized, quick grab'n'go each morning... what more could you ask for?

So on the menu this week...

• Strawberry Oatmeal Crumble (with a hint of lemon!)
• Roasted Vegetables (a light lunch, good for pre-rehearsal tummies)
• Honey Garlic Chicken (with veggies and rice on the side)

Breakfast

First off, I start with breakfast. I found this Strawberry Oatmeal Crumble when I was first looking into meal-prepping from Meal Prep Rockstar (recipe here). This sweet (dare I mention, vegan!) treat is a favorite of mine and it feels like you're having dessert for breakfast. I always tend to opt for a sweet breakfast over a savory one, so this recipe is perfect. The little bit of lemon zest adds a nice little kick of sweetness!

Lunch

Next come the veggies. I used this vegetable hash recipe in the past but ended up overcrowding my poor sauté pan. SO this time I decided to try roasting them instead. Using this guide from the kitchn I roasted up the hash's original veggies in this way:

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.
2. Chop however many sweet potatoes (I used 3) and however many red potatoes (I used 2) you want. Slice up an onion (I used a sweet onion). Toss in olive oil, season with salt and pepper (and crushed red pepper, if you want), and throw those babies in a baking dish (or two if it seems too crowded). Throw 'em in your preheated oven for 15mins. Meanwhile...
3. Chop up your bell pepper (I used one but am wanting more) and kale (about 4 cups when chopped). Toss them with olive oil in a bowl. Season. Once the taters and onions have been in the oven for 15 minutes, mix the bell pepper and kale in and place in the oven for another 15, or until they look like they're crispy to your liking.
4. If you plan to eat some roasted veggie "hash" when you're cooking it, throw a can of drained/rinsed black beans in there for the last 5 minutes to heat 'em up. If you're just prepping for the week, toss them in after the veggies are completely done.

In short:

425 degrees

Sweet pot / Red pot = chop, toss with olive oil, season, in (the oven)!

15 mins later add...

Bell pepp / kale (chopped, oiled, seasoned)

Add beans (drained, rinsed)

Done

(Becca shorthand. Modeled after Gordon Ramsay's Ultimate Cooking Course)

Dinner

And last, Slow Cooker Honey Garlic Chicken, which my fiance found on reddit. Apparently the recipe is from Tasty.

Watch the gif here: https://i.imgur.com/UOcAncI.mp4

Here it is word for word!

INGREDIENTS

• 8 chicken thighs
• 1 pound baby red potatoes
• 1 pound baby carrots
• 1 pound green beans

For the sauce

• 1/2 cup honey
• 1/2 cup reduced sodium soy sauce
• 4 cloves minced garlic
• 1 teaspoon dried basil
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper

INSTRUCTIONS

1. In a large bowl, mix honey, soy sauce, garlic, basil, oregano, red pepper flakes and pepper.
2. Place 4 chicken thighs in the bottom of a 6-qt slow cooker. Pour half of the soy mixture over the chicken. Throw in the baby red potatoes, carrots, then the other 4 chicken thighs. Season the top layer of chicken to taste, then pour the rest of the soy mixture over the chicken.
3. Cover and cook on low heat for 7-8 hours or high for 3-4 hours. Feel free to baste midway. Add green beans during the last 30 minutes of cooking time.
4. Optional: Broil the cooked chicken thighs, skin side up to brown and crisp the skins, about 3-4 minutes.
5. Serve immediately and enjoy!

In short:

Chop carrots and red potatoes. Mince garlic. Trim green beans. Rinse chicken.

Mix up sauce ingredients in a separate bowl.

Into the slow cooker: half the chicken, half the sauce, all veggies, remaining chicken, remaining sauce.

Low 7-8 hours -OR- High 3-4 hours

Turn off, add green beans and cover for about 30 mins.

(this way the green beans stay crunchier, which I like)

I usually end up using 8-10 chicken thighs for each batch. Skin-on, bone-in gives it nice flavor.

Then I quickly whip up some garlic rice in the following way...

-Mince 2-4 garlic cloves.

-Head a glug of olive oil in a medium pot over medium heat.

-Saute garlic until fragrant and season with salt.

-Add 1 cup rice, 2 cups of water (or homemade veggie broth, recipe to follow in future posts) and cook according to package directions (bring to boil over high heat, simmer over low heat until liquid is absorbed)

And just like that, you have food for the whole week. Pretty convenient and delicious. Happy cooking!

Fall Festivities 2016

I mentioned in my first post that the idea for this blog started with my attempt to make this autumn as "Fall Festive" as possible. I made a checklist of different fall-related activities that I wanted to do and I ended up going above and beyond what I'd originally planned! I figured I'd share a few of the activities here, since I've just completed the last item on my checklist today!

The Checklist

I started of simple, one might even say "basic," getting the traditional Starbucks pumpkin spice latte. I know it's cliche but I couldn't resist. I actually got invited to coffee, specifically at Starbucks that day, by chance!

More basics in place: stocked up on fall spices and produce. I accidentally ended up with three jars of cloves... at least I'm ready!

I also ended up, weeks later, mixing up my own pumpkin pie spice when I realized that I didn't have any!

Homemade / Hand Lettered

A staple fall activity for me is making my traditional pumpkin cookies with a sweet orange zest frosting. The cookies are only mildly sweet on their own, and the orange adds a nice brightness to the pumpkin.

I made sure to enjoy the changing colors...

Got cozy with slow cooker meals, stews, and bonfires with s'mores...

Apple Cider Pork Sandwiches

Autumn Beef Stew

Homemade Veggie Stock

Got a little spooky and a little goofy on Halloween...

(that's my fish's face on the left)

Made a few sips...

Cider Prep

Homemade Cider

Bourbon Apple Cider Cocktail

Made the house festive...

(because I'm basically a 4th grade art teacher)

Homemade Pumpkin Spice Candle

Baked to my heart's content...

Fresh Bread from Scratch

Sweet Potato Bread with Brown Sugar Frosting

Pumpkin Pound Cake

And finally today, finishing off my checklist for this gorgeous season, I made my own hot cocoa mix from scratch!

Feeling very glad that I set out to make this autumn special. I don't think I would've done half of these things without setting the goal in the first place. I feel like I could keep going with these but I have to save something for next year! Plus I think it's important to focus in on the upcoming holidays (I haven't bought a single Christmas gift yet!), wedding planning, and time with my man! I know I finish just about every post with this, but only because chronicling things like this highlights it more and more; I really can't believe how much I have to be thankful for.

PS - If you want to see more specifics about each of these photos, check out the captions on my Instagram! <3

Pre-Thanksgiving Thank Yous

Just a quick post here because I forgot earlier this week! I sent out my engagement thank you cards a few days ago after FINALLY finishing the envelopes. I'm a bit of a perfectionist, so these can be very time consuming...

And a quick, almost-completed return address on the back of each one...

Love and gratitude!

Thanksgiving Run Down

Thanksgiving in Wisconsin was a hit! I was a little bit daunted by all of the cooking and prepping that was necessary to make it all happen, but everything came together in the end.

First off, a few days before Thanksgiving I baked a quick apple crisp for us to enjoy leading up to the big day. For me, holidays and birthdays end up being more of week-long celebrations rather than just lasting the day. Spreading out the celebration never hurt anyone, in my humble opinion.

Next, on the morning before Thanksgiving I made a cherry pie. I figured getting that out of the way would be a relief and would free up oven space on the big day. I made the same crust that I'd made the previous week for the apple pie, and I used some cherry pie filling my parents had bought while on vacation recently. The pie crust did not turn out quite as perfectly as apple pie from last week, but I'm still happy I insisted on making it from scratch. Can't go wrong with all that butter, after all!

That evening I whipped up a dish of baked macaroni and cheese. We figured that, because our Thanksgiving dinner menu was already so massive for five people, we might as well spread out the goodness and enjoy a decadent preview of the main event. I used Alton Brown's Baked Macaroni and Cheese recipe and it didn't let us down. Ben and I always trust Alton's scientific approach to cooking; his recipes are our go-to.

On Wednesday, Ben started brining the turkey and then early Thanksgiving morning he rinsed and stuffed the turkey, again using Alton Brown's "Good Eats" Roast Turkey recipe. Once the turkey was in the oven that was my signal to start prepping.

Onions were chopped, potatoes were peeled, cheese was grated, seasonings were measured, garlic was minced, and lemons were zested. I put everything into little portion containers: ramekins, cereal bowls, measuring cups, shot glasses... whatever I could find! Mom and my brother helped with the more tedious preparation, and Mom made her traditional stuffing.

We set the table, plated the pre-made sides (olives, cranberries, etc), and I placed all of the ingredients by their recipe sheets, ready for the chaos of whipping all the sides together in the 30 mins.

These are the recipes we used:

Creamy Garlic Mashed Potatoes by Alton Brown

Homemade Gravy by Good Housekeeping

Green Beans Gremolata by Ina Garten (made this last year with Ben's family)

Sautéed Fresh Corn by Ina Garten (I souped this one up with bacon, onion, and cream)

Here's how I prepped the ingredients for each recipe (more for myself, for the future, each bulletpoint is its own container)

Mashed Potatoes

-Large pot: peeled/chopped potatoes, water, salt

-Medium pot: cream, milk, garlic

-Parmesan

Gravy

-Butter (will start first in pan)

-Chopped Onions

-Flour

-Salt and pepper

-Broth and brandy

-Cream

Green Beans Gremolata

-Trimmed green beans (use same bowl for ice bath and storage after blanched beans are dried)

-Toasted pine nuts (microwave in ramekin), lemon zest, Parmesan, garlic

-Salt and pepper

Sautéed Corn

-Butter

-Bacon and onion

-Corn

-Salt and pepper

-Heavy cream

The whole cooking process pivoted around taking the turkey out and popping Mom's stuffing in the oven for the last 30 minutes.

Here's the run down of what I ended up doing (again, mostly for me to remember for the future)

• 30 minutes before turkey's out: start boiling water for the green beans
• 20 minutes before turkey's out: start boiling the salted potato water
• 15 minutes before turkey's out: blanch green beans, drain, ice bath, and dry
• Turkey's out! Stuffing's in!
• 30 minutes before stuffing's out: start butter/onion mixture for gravy and start simmering cream/milk/garlic for mashed potatoes
• 20 minutes before stuffing's out: start bacon/onion for the corn, finish adding gravy ingredients, cream/milk/garlic for mash should be done
• 15 minutes before stuffing's out: begin sautéing green beans, gravy should be done, potatoes should be done, delegate potato mashing/mixing (hand mixer works so well) to sous chef
• 10 minutes before stuffing's out: drain excess bacon fat and begin sautéing corn
• 5 minutes before stuffing's out: stir up gremolata

Somehow it all came together on time. I had run through the sequence a few times in my head but wasn't sure how well all of the components would coordinate. I definitely used a TON of dishes, but I think it was worth it and not a bad attempt for my first go at it!

We feasted and all felt very fat and happy. We even had to take a brief recess between the main meal and dessert to give our stomachs a chance to rest. Overall a very successful and exciting Thanksgiving.

Quarter Century Joys

I got to spend my birthday together with my parents for the first time since 2007 this year. I've always been away studying or dancing professionally, usually preparing for a holiday show at this time of year, so it was nice to get to spend some time together.

I started off the day with a warm mug of coffee and then whipped up some (again Paula Deen recipe) biscuits for everyone to munch on. Next we all sat down and strategized about Thanksgiving. I had a list of different side dishes and links to recipes that we had to narrow down to feed only five people. Probably the 10-12 recipes I had scouted out would have yielded more than needed to feed five.

After choosing our recipes I wrote down a grocery list and order-of-operations for Thanksgiving day, and we all ran to the grocery to pick up ingredients and supplies. Ben grabbed a "Tippy Cow" Wisconsin-original rum and cream sample pack, which is similar to Bailey's and totally delicious!

Next my mom and I started talking about wedding plans and ended up looking through necklaces and earrings that had sentimental value. We moved upstairs and uncovered some wedding memories of her own: a wedding photo album, a few custom printed napkins, a fancy pen with a long plume (for guestbook signing)....

Especially sweet to unpack were my mom's veil and wedding dress. Peeling back the crinkly blue tissue paper, I noted that my mom and I have similar priorities when it comes to wedding attire: delicate lace details and a taste for something dramatic (in this case, the long, gorgeous train). She let me try both pieces on and it was so special for her to share that with me. At twenty-five we were almost exactly the same size!

We headed out to dinner at a nice steak restaurant. We feasted on potato croquettes, bacon-wrapped maple-whisky-glazed scallops, French onion soup, filet and ribeye, asparagus, and risotto...plus plenty of wine! We chatted, joked, reminisced, and laughed. I took free birthday dessert to go and we finished off the night by watching a light-hearted movie. It was a productive and enjoyable birthday, filled with love and anticipation for the year to come.

A Festive Friday Shindig

I decided I wanted to entertain and connect with my dance friends one more time before Thanksgiving. So on Friday I hosted a casual post-show, post-engagement get together! I had a ton of fun planning and preparing food for my friends, and we all ended up having a really nice time!

First things first: I decided to tackle and apple pie. It was one of the final things on my fall to-do list and I figured this would be a perfect time to make it! I used a Paula Deen recipe and made the crust from scratch. It ended up being a pretty simple process; even rolling it out wasn't very labor-intensive, thank goodness!

When I sliced up the apples and poured the sugar-and-spice coated filling into the pie crust, I could not believe how much filling there was for this one pie! I stepped back and looked at the towering pile of apples and couldn't help but laugh out loud. I took the picture below to send to Ben with the message, "You sure? Whatever you say, Paula."

Thankfully the filing didn't seem quite as disproportionate once I took a few moments to arrange the apples properly. Got it to a slightly more manageable size and sealed the "lid!"

While the pie was baking I went outside and collected a few freshly-fallen leaves from our maple tree. I grabbed my gold calligraphy ink and whipped up a few small place cards for each of the dishes. I popped up some popcorn and started slicing and oiling up some corn tortillas to make some baked tortilla chips ...And all the while the scent of cinnamon, nutmeg, sweet apples, and butter started to seep out of the oven and perfume the whole house!

Thank goodness for that egg wash!

I'm pretty proud of the result. Almost looks like it's straight out of a cartoon!

My very good friend is vegan, so I started brewing up some vegan pumpkin chili! I prepped all of the ingredients the night before, so it was a quick and easy dump n' stir process! I baked up several pans of tortillas and packed a basket full of tortilla chips. The house was really smelling sexy at this point.

Last but definitely not least I simmered up some mulled wine using bottle of merlot, an orange, honey, spices, and cider. I've never made mulled wine before but I am absolutely sold on having it be a autumn/winter tradition every month! So cozy and scrumptious! To finish it off, I peeled off a strip of orange rind for each mug of wine!

The last step was to put it all together! I grabbed my favorite crate tabletop-prop, a bunch of mugs, the new serving utensils my parents gifted me, and the leaves I'd gathered and arranged everything in its place...

Tah-Dah!! 

My friends and I ended up having a really lovely time together. I was very grateful to get to spend some time with them again before the holiday. Feeling lots of gratitude moving into this holiday season!

Gettin' Organized in Style (style is attempted anyways)

I have so been looking forward to wedding planning for SO long, but I wanted to go ahead and made sure that I accomplished a few things first, regarding our engagement.

First, I wanted to make sure that I got some nice rest and me-time at home. It feels nice to sink back into domestic life after being in rigorous dance-survival mode for quite some time. So step one was give myself time to sip on some coffee, read a few of my favorite blogs, listen to some music, and really just give myself time to settle into relaxation mode.

Next on the priority list has been making and writing thank you notes to those who either made a long trip or helped out specially with Ben's big proposal. I quickly lettered a few unique thank you cards in a whimsical modern script, and then stamped them with a stamp and silver in that I had gotten at Paper Source the day before!

Still in the process of writing these, but I've got a good head start!

Next I uncovered and dusted off something I've been hiding away for a few months: the Southern Weddings Planner! I was first introduced to Southern Weddings when one of Ben's sisters got married, and after browsing their blog for only a few days I was sold on buying the planner! I stashed it away, knowing that it would be useful in the future!

And lastly (for now), I used another stamp to make some quick and easy stationary to add to the binder. I figured buying a stamp, ink, and regular card stock would be much more affordable than investing in stationary. I like how they turned out!

I'm off to finish thank you notes and address a few envelopes!

Treat Yo' Self - A Lady's Day Out

We woke up on Monday and immediately realized that it had been exactly 3.5 years since Ben and I exchanged "I love you's" for the first time! I made coffee and sliced up tasty Bread Basket sweets that had been gifted to us, as well as fresh fruit and some more cheese. We munched and snacked and I started to build a plan for myself for the day.

I figured that all of this hubbub was a good excuse to get my shops on while Ben was at work, and so I spoiled myself for a day. You have to understand, as a frugally-raised lady from the Midwest, it's really hard to let myself buy anything that seems too lavish. My incapacity to buy, even things that are essential to day-to-day life, has gotten better over the years but it's a little tug in the back of my mind whenever I'm at the store.

SO I headed over to the Green Hills area, the best spot for a ritzy-stroll and overspending,  and sat down to respond to the outpouring of congratulations on social media. I then headed over to Paper Source for a few basic stamping supplies. I got a much-needed haircut and then walked around the mall, sporting some swanky boot-heels, purple leggings, and my favorite gray sweater. Especially with a new haircut, I felt like the stereotypical basic rich b****, which was fun to try on for a few hours. I ended up buying a deep-pink / reddish sweater to continue with the theme of rosiness.

AND, once I got to the nail salon (because, I mean, how are you going to take a good engagement ring selfie with naked nail... I am rolling my eyes as i type, but hey, treat yo'self!) I chose a hand lotion called "Roses are Red." I'm all about the accidental turned somewhat-intentional theme-ing and motif-ing!

I decided to go with a classic French manicure, though Ben encouraged a bright red shade. I've always been one to enjoy something a little more subtle and classic; I guess I'm a little too cautious to FULLY commit to the rose theme.

I think it turned out alright anyways! Sweet Ben posed me on the porch in the sunlight and shot/edited the photo.

After an extended-lounge at the nail salons I headed home and cooked dinner: ingredients and recipes provided by the head chef of L'Apron Bleu, of course. ;) A good day of reflection, consumerism, self-pampering, and me time after a challenging and difficult few months. Life is good.